RE: Slashdot reply (draft 0.1)

[Hugo.van.der.Kooij@caiw.nl]

On Fri, 11 Feb 2000, Gregory Leblanc wrote:

> <flame>This is really stupid.  I'm sure there's a logic behind this, but I
> can't grasp what it is.  I understand why these were put in place, but not
> why they're still in use.  We should abolish silly distinctions to allow
> authors to more easily submit documents, especially since we're accepting
> DocBook.  Hugo van der Wahls (I think I spelled that right) has made some
> RPMs of the new versions of SGMLTools, so at least some people can do the
> translation from DocBook to other formats.  Calling your document a FAQ
> because you don't know any breed of SGML other than HTML is silly.  If we're
> going to use the terms "FAQ", "HOWTO", "GUIDE", and whatever else, it should
> be because the document logically is a FAQ, because it's a series of
> questions, or a HOWTO, because it tells HOW TO do something.  If we're going
> to classify documents by their format, let's just DO IT, and make categories
> based on format.  But the best thing for users is to classify documents by
> structure/content, and keep sections like HOWTO, FAQ, etc.  If necessary, we
> could break sections down something similar to:

<Water>
The author seems to mix Hugo van der Kooij and Norman Walsh. So this
bucket of water will cool the heat of this flame.
</Water>

But I agree the distinction between the various types should be made based
on the content.

So I suggest:

 - Howto	Focus on getting the job done
 - Guide	Focus on telling you what the subject is al about
 - FAQ		Questions and Answers
 - Others

It's hard to draw a straight line as a Howto may end up becoming a Guide
in the long run. The goal should be to allow as many technical formats as
possible. That would mean document written in:
 - Linuxdoc SGML
 - DocBook SGML
 - ASCII
 - HTML
 - LaTeX

Just my 0.02 Euro's.

Hugo.

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